


light to his darkness

by Runespoor



Category: DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Batman needs a Robin, Even Robining, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-29
Updated: 2011-11-29
Packaged: 2017-10-26 16:40:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/285535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Runespoor/pseuds/Runespoor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In Gotham City, even Robins raise you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	light to his darkness

**Author's Note:**

> prompt: Technical Pacifist.

“This sucks, boss,” Robin grouches.

It’s the third time in as many nights she’s expressed her displeasure with Batman’s way of doing things. And while Batman cannot begrudge her her disgust at having to wait, he’d appreciate if her frustration could take the backseat on getting this one done.

“So you’ve mentioned,” he blandly agrees.

“Yeah, because it _sucks_.” She is not actually pouting. It merely sounds like she is, and just refraining from punching the brick wall behind them, since she’s so far forbidden from punching the living daylights out of her current targets. Which Batman _really_ cannot begrudge her.

Very briefly, Batman ponders the idea going in and extracting the information they need to get the kidnapped children with their fists. That tactic often works. Maybe this time Oracle was mistaken when she stressed that the goons she’d managed to pin-point didn’t know where the children had been taken. It’s possible for Oracle to be wrong sometimes. That it happens more rarely than his being wrong is a source of comfort, but maybe—

This fancy is promptly followed by his contemplating ordering Robin back to the Cave for the night. He could spin it as a sanction for her impatience. She would sulk, but she’d do as told. But the truth of the matter is that he just wants to remove the source of the temptation. In effect he’d be punishing her for his own weakness, and punishing Robin for doing what Robin is supposed to do.

“We’ll wait until Hatter calls them to heel,” he repeats the plan aloud. For himself as much as Robin. He wonders if she knows this.

She grumbles under her breath, but it’s the kind that means that yeah, she’s going to fucking wait. Good soldier. It’s the kind that makes Batman acutely aware that he’s responsible for these young people fighting for the Mission; and, though it’s not meant to, also makes him acutely aware that whatever happens to the kidnapped children is on his head.

Batman desperately wants to shake Hatter so hard his teeth rattle. Or at the very least, to ram the no-good low-lives devouring take-out like they haven’t been accessories to kidnapping into a wall.

“Scumbags,” Robin mumbles next to him, glaring at the men.

Two of them have children of their own, and of the two one is running late on child support; according to his bank statement, it’s the first payment he’s missed in two years. Batman fleetingly considers telling Robin so, but he knows already what her reaction will be: _all the more fucking reason for them to keep their nose fucking clean_. As empathy didn’t stop them from abducting children younger than their own, he can see her point.

“When we intervene, you can break their teeth,” he hears himself say.

She doesn’t – quite – brighten. Her glower is as hard as a minute ago, and if she’s smiling— she’s more showing her teeth.

“Cool,” she says, fierce. Maybe _brighten_ was the word, after all.


End file.
